When you look at the exorbitant prices and mostly bad service, it's a wonder that anyone in Serbia still rides an intercity bus. How is it possible that it is often cheaper to go by private car and when will the buses finally be superseded
Sonja (24) often as a student travels between Niš and Belgrade. And he mostly chooses "Bla Bla Car", a service where people who travel privately by car they offer to connect someone else and thus reduce their travel expenses or even a little profit.
Each driver chooses the price, but for the trip between Niš and Belgrade they usually ask between 1.300 and 1.900 dinars.
"The drivers always honor the agreement, and it often happens that they take us to the exact location or to the place that suits us best." This type of transportation has always been profitable for me because it takes less time, is more comfortable, and sometimes the prices are cheaper than the bus," Sonja tells "Vreme".
Because, for example, Niš Ekspres offers one-way tickets for 1.700 to 1.900 dinars, and it is similar with other carriers.
The bus loses the price race not only with the "Blah Blah Car" but also with the private car - provided that it has more passengers. Thus, from Niš to Belgrade, about 4.600 dinars are spent on gasoline and tolls, which means that a car with a driver and two other passengers costs less per person than a bus ticket.
There is no need to talk about comfort and the fact that the car drives exactly where it should. "Also, it's very good that you are free to ask for a break during the journey, while this is not the case with bus or train carriers," Sonja continues, talking about her experience with Bla Bla Car.
A bus is more expensive than a car.
Research by "Vremena" shows that bus tickets are too expensive even when it comes to other destinations, compared to Bla Bla Car or the cost of gasoline and tolls.
For example, buses from Belgrade to Novi Sad run for 640 to 1.020 dinars, while drivers on the Bla Bla Car service offer rides for 500 to 700 dinars. Admittedly, in the case of Novi Sad and the capital, there is no other high-speed train in which you can get there in half an hour for 600 dinars.
The bus between Belgrade and Čačak costs 850 to 1.200 dinars in one direction, slightly more expensive than Bla Bla Car. The biggest saving is on the route Belgrade-Vranje, where a bus ticket costs over three thousand dinars, while rides on the Bla Bla Car can be found half as cheap.
Isidora (22) from Vranje says that she avoids the local carrier on the way to Belgrade because "the prices are huge and the service is not that good."
"For example, whenever I traveled from Belgrade, I had to check the ticket for tomorrow's departure the day before, which is tiring because sometimes I don't know the day before that I will be going," she says.
Although it can be said in favor of bus carriers that they give discounts for students or pensioners, and that the ride is somewhat cheaper if you take a return ticket, the question arises, how is it possible that it is cheaper to travel by car than by bus, which should transport dozens of people at once?
"The price of fuel here is floating." Now it is three dinars less compared to the previous period, in the future it will be 3 or 5 dinars more, and the price of the ticket is constant", Mihailo Ivanović, a traffic safety officer at "Jugoprevoz" from Velika Plana, tells us.
"The price of fuel was a third of the price of the ticket, and today it is more than half of the price." For all carriers, the price of fuel is the biggest item, as well as in freight traffic. On the other hand, spare parts are very expensive," he adds.
The younger ones share the transportation.
BlaBla clearly endangers bus operators by stealing their younger clientele, especially when it comes to longer routes.
Students who spoke to "Vreme" say that air conditioners often do not work in buses, and if they do, it is extremely hot or cold in the transport, the buses are old and sometimes feel unsafe, and they say that the train takes too long to travel.
The Belgrade bus station did not have answers to our questions because they "exclusively deal with the reception and dispatch of passengers and buses", they do not have their own buses and data on the number of passengers, but based on conversations with carriers, they learned that BlaBla car takes away a part of passengers, especially the younger population.
"I definitely think that other carriers see BlaBla as a threat, because it is much better organized, more flexible, it gives people more options when looking at where they will travel and with whom," Maria (23), who uses BlaBla both as a passenger and as a the driver.
"It happened to me that my ride was chosen by an elderly woman, but she explained that her cousin had found her a ride and told her where and when she should be," says Maria.
The train should bury the bus.
But there is no logic in all of this when it comes to the sustainability of traffic and environmental protection in a country where the air is already polluted beyond borders.
Namely, it is more logical for fifty passengers to be transported by one bus than fifteen or twenty cars. As it makes more sense to make it cheaper. But there is no logic here.
She, on the other hand, hesitates when it comes to a fast train (or at least one that would not be as slow as in the 19th century). This is now the case on the Novi Sad-Belgrade route and nowhere else.
According to our interlocutors, the train to Niš is a complete waste of time because it takes seven hours or more.
"Compared to the bus, it is much cheaper, but not so much compared to Bla Bla." On average, I travel with it once a month because I love it, but if you don't have time, it's not that profitable. It takes me more than four hours to get from Belgrade to Jagodina by train," says Luka (25).
The construction of a high-speed railway from Belgrade to Niš was announced, which would shorten the travel time to about a hundred minutes. It will take a huge chunk of the pie away from the bus operators.
"Just as our sister company Bečej has a problem with Sokol, we will probably lose a portion of passengers when they introduce the Belgrade-Nis high-speed railway, because it will be faster to arrive by train, there will be more departures and it will be more efficient and cost-effective," says Ivanovic.
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